


You and me (and our friend Yvette)

by Ptolemia



Category: Borderlands, Tales from the Borderlands - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, F/M, Fluff, I mean, M/M, and some very very silly au references, please prepare for an onslaught of sickeningly sweet bro times, very silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-22
Updated: 2015-07-22
Packaged: 2018-04-10 14:16:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4395029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ptolemia/pseuds/Ptolemia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sickeningly sweet au none of you asked for, but you're damn well getting it anyway. </p><p>Rhys and Vaughn go on a date to the theme park. Yvette comes with them because, hey, she's their best friend and if she wants to crash their date she damn well can. Fiona finally has a crush on somebody who doesn't have a girlfriend, and is screamingly awkward about it. Sasha in NO WAY has ANY kind of relationship with August. Vasquez is an asshole and deserves to have his cereal stolen. Professor Vallory is terrifying, Professor Jack is pretty damn weird, and Rhys should probably be doing that essay that's due Tuesday...</p><p>Also? Playing monopoly with your friends is a surefire way to make them really, really angry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You and me (and our friend Yvette)

**Author's Note:**

> fun fact of the day: i fuckin love yvette/fiona like?? whats not to like. their ship name would be LUNCH MONEY. i thought i was alone in this but today i actually saw FANART which made my life and then i was like. dang. should probably finish this fic. fuckin love yvette/fiona. LOVE IT.
> 
> also theres a lot of references in this and a couple lines paraphrased from the game so uh. have fun spottin those or whatever. oh, and the title is a play on that one song that goes, like, 'u and me and ur friend steve' 
> 
> this was from a tumblr prompt for gayperion at a themepark but at this point its more abt monopoly and yvette bein a babe so uh??? sorry abt that. and talkin of tumblr!! moist-von-lipwig.tumblr.com - thats my url. come say hi! <3

Yvette traipses into the living room in her pyjamas, bowl of cereal in hand, and flops onto the couch next to Rhys. “Morning!”

“Afternoon, Yvette.”

She waves her spoon in dismissal, flicking milk over the carpet. “Yeah, yeah, same difference.”

“I can't believe you're only just eating breakfast at two in the afternoon.”

“And I can't believe you're sitting watching cartoons instead of doing that essay you were supposed to do yesterday.”

“Oh, we're gonna do this? Because I could bring up the fact that you should be in a lecture right now.”

“I know, I know, but I said to myself - Yvette, do you want to go to your lecture or do you want to eat cereal and pester Rhys and Vaughn? Girl's gotta prioritize sometimes.” She yawns. “Where is mister small but mighty, anyway? I need to make sure I keep the pestering even. Can't spend my whole day annoying you and you alone, y'know?”

“Oh, wow, Yvette, you're such a wonderful person.”

“I know, I know. It's tough, but one of us has to set an example.”

 

Vaughn pokes his head round the door. “Wait, did somebody ask for me?”

“Yvette's just stirring shit. Don't worry about it, bro. You can get on with your assignment.”

Vaughn sighs. “I dunno. It's not going anywhere much. I made a bad calculation somewhere a little way back, and I'm pretty sure I know how to fix it but it means I need to go through again and... maybe I could do with a break.”

Rhys grins, reaching a hand out. “C'mere, then.”

Vaughn takes his hand, and leans in for a kiss.

Yvette rolls her eyes. “Hey, come on, some of us are trying to eat.”

“Yeah, and some of us are trying to-” begins Rhys, then narrows his eyes at the bowl in Yvette's hand, “Wait, hang on, whose Frosties are those? Because if you've taken my food again I swear-”

“Relax,” she says, “They're Hugo's.”

“Oh. Well. Go ahead and eat them, then. Fuck that guy.”

Vaughn settles himself in between the other two. “I'm pretty sure he has some ice cream in the freezer, too.”

Yvette beams, “Hey, nice, I'll have that later. Or maybe tomorrow. Don't want to take too much of his stuff at once, or he'll yell at me again.”

“I'm pretty sure he won't even notice,” says Rhys, “He's barely been out of his room since Professor Vallory called us all out on not doing that economics project properly and he tried to talk back.”

Vaughn shakes his head. “That was the stupidest thing I've ever seen anyone do, and given that I hang out with you guys, that's saying something.”

“Oh?” says Yvette. “What happened?”

“It was brutal,” says Rhys, “I almost felt sorry for him. Almost. He was all 'ohhh Vallory I'll fix this I can blah blah blah something or other' and she just – man, she just totally shot him down. She didn't even yell for that long, but it was... yeah. Brutal.”

“Brutal,” agrees Vaughn, “Just... bam. Wasted. He looked mortified.”

Yvette hums thoughtfully. “Oh, so that's what's been up with him. I knocked on his door earlier and he said he was sleeping. Figured he must be pretty upset about something.”

“What were you doing trying to talk to Hugo?”

“I, uh, well, I wanted somebody to cook me breakfast and I figured-” Yvette has the good grace to look guilty for a moment. “I mean, I hate him too, don't get me wrong, but the guy can cook! No harm keeping in with somebody who can cook.”

Rhys rolls his eyes and turns back to the tv. “Traitor,” he mutters.

 

Yvette doesn't try to argue with that – which is wise, because she wouldn't have a leg to stand on. But after a moment she puts her bowl down on the side-table and says, “So, anyway, what are we doing today? I'm kinda bored.”

“Well,” says Vaughn, “Me and Rhys were thinking of heading down to the theme park later this afternoon.”

“Nice!” says Yvette, “I've been meaning to go for a while now.”

“Uh, yeah, the thing is, it was more... I mean, me and Rhys were thinking... I mean...”

“It's a date,” says Rhys, bluntly.

Vaughn smiles fondly at him. “Yeah. A date.”

“Ok,” says Yvette. “That's nice. What time are we leaving? I need to shower.”

“Yvette, listen. I don't know how to make this more obvious. Me and Vaughn are going out. On a date.”

“Yeah, that's nice, but when is it? I need to be dressed in time.”

“You're not invited.”

“I know. I'm gonna come anyway.” She scoops her bowl up and strides off into the kitchen, turning her head as she steps through the door to smirk at them over her shoulder.

 

Rhys groans.

“Hey,” says Vaughn, “Hey, it's alright man.”

Rhys sighs, and slouches over sideways until his head is in Vaughn's lap. “Guess we'll have company, then.”

“Well, it's always nice to spend some time with Yvette.”

“Yeah but... urgh.”

Vaughn strokes Rhys' hair gently, “Stop fussing, bro. You're just stressed out because you've been working too hard.”

“No, but I haven't! You've been getting on with stuff, I've just been... I don't even know what I've been doing. Where did my time go? I have an essay due Tuesday and I just don't care any more.”

“Well, you've probably stressed yourself out thinking about what you need to do, huh?”

“Yeah. Exactly.” Rhys throws a hand over his eyes and whines. “I have so much to do.” He sighs. “So much.”

“Uh-huh? You want to talk about it?”

“No! And you're derailing this. I was saying,” he says, raising his voice in hopes the subject of his wrath will hear him from the other room, “that Yvette is driving me round the bend.”

“Hey, now-”

“I mean one date, that's all I'm asking. One date Yvette doesn't invite herself to. One!”

Vaughn laughs, and leans down to kiss his forehead. “Dude, calm down. We get enough time to ourselves. Yvette can crash a couple of dates, she's our best friend.”

 

“Yeah, I... yeah,” says Rhys, and goes to pull Vaughn in for a proper kiss - but just as he does Yvette saunters back in, still grinning away. “Damn right I can crash your dates. You can't kick Harry out of the golden trio!”

Rhys sits up, fuming once more. “For the last time, you are not Harry. I'm Harry.”

Vaughn sighs. “Please, can we not do this again?”

“Um,” says Yvette, “pretty sure you can't be Harry, on account of the fact that you are Ron.”

“I am not-”

Yvette points at Vaughn. “Smart one,” at Rhys, “stupid one,” and then at herself, “chosen one. Sorry Rhys, I don't make the rules.”

“Oh you are just-”

“Hey,” she says, holding a few pieces of cardboard under his nose, “Look what I got, thought.”

Rhys blinks. “Some chopped-up bits of cereal box?”

“Coupons,” says Yvette, proudly, “for the theme park.”

“Which you cut out of my cereal boxes after eating all my cereal last week.”

“Oh, details, details. And actually some of them are from Hugo's cereal.”

“Well... I guess I approve of anything that involves messing with his stuff. You know he's scratched everyone's names off the cleaning rota and put me down for all the chores?”

“What, again?” says Vaughn. “Why?”

Rhys shrugs.

“Dude, did you steal the car from his monopoly set again? You know he gets mad when he has to be the boot.”

“Yeah, well, maybe if he didn't want me taking his stuff hostage he wouldn't screw me over every time we play that damn game!”

 

Yvette yawns. “Well, I really don't want to start a replay of the monopoly argument, but in fairness to Hugo, you guys did actually steal ten million dollars last time we played.”

“Only because he was going to take it if we didn't,” grumbles Vaughn.

Rhys nods, “Yeah, and then Fiona had it off us-”

“And then Sasha said-”  
Yvette raises her hands. “Ok, ok! How about we all get dressed and never speak about monopoly again. Sound good to you?”

“Technically,” says Rhys, “You're the only person who needs to get dressed.”  
Yvette rolls her eyes. “Alright! I'm up late, I'm a terrible person, I get it. So, let me put it like this – how about I go get dressed, you never talk about monopoly again, and we all go out and catch a ride at the theme park. Sound good?”

“Yeah but-”

“Rhys,” growls Yvette, “I know I am not going to be hearing you threatening to murder-”

“-I was mostly joking-”

“-your beloved fellow housemates-”  
“-literally just Hugo-”  
“-over some stupid game-”

“-and he threatened to kill me first-

“-ever again!”

Rhys sighs. “Fine. Fine! No more monopoly.”

“Thank you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to shower, and I will be dressed and ready to crash your date in,” she looks at the clock, “twenty minutes.”

 

Yvette steps sharply into the bathroom, grabbing her towel as she goes. After a moment the sound of running water is drowned out by an enthusiastic rendition of Shania Twain's 'That don't impress me much'.

“I'll give her this,” mutters Rhys, “She is a pretty good singer.”

Vaughn smiles and curls himself up against Rhys' side. “Mmm.”

Rhys glances down, and plants a kiss on the top of Vaughn's head. “So...”

“So?”

He shrugs. “I dunno. You're cute. I missed you.”

Vaughn snorts, “What, since you last came snooping round my room trying to distract me from my assignment... uh, what, an hour ago? And I mean, an hour at the max. More like forty-five minutes.”

“Uh, yeah. I guess. I mean, not like... urgh. You know, when you put it like that you make it sound kinda stupid.”

“Well, maybe it is stupid,” says Vaughn, leaning up to give Rhys a kiss, “and maybe I like it anyway. For some reason.”

Rhys tilts his head back, leaning out of Vaughn's reach with a grin.

Vaughn makes a little grumbling noise of discontent. “Hey, come on, not cool.”

“Well, maybe if you wanted a kiss,” says Rhys, having to scramble up onto the back of the couch to avoid Vaughns clutches, “you shouldn't have called me stupid.”

“I didn't say you were- hey, stop that! Rhys, c'mon, you'll fall off the back of the couch-”

Rhys grabs a cushion and swats at Vaughn. “Yeah, well, if I fall, I'll fall victorious. Like some kind of... big knight guy...”

“Sir Rhys the Freakishly Tall?”

“Shut up man! I'd be, like, Sir Rhys the... really cool. Or something.”

Vaughn giggles, managing to land a kiss on Rhy's neck before Rhys pushes him back and flails his way back out of reach.

Vaughn shakes his head in mock-dismay. “Wow, bro, that how it is?”

“Yeah,” says Rhys, “Yeah, it's like... I'm over here. And you're not.”

“Oh, well. Hey, fine.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah!”

Rhys smirks. “You gonna do something about it?”

“Oh, it is ON.”

Rhys just laughs, scrambling off the couch and onto his feet. “Sorry, what was that? I can't hear you from up here.”

Vaughn tumbles after him, wheezing with laughter. “Dude, stop it, oh my god...” he grabs Rhys by the waist, and kisses his chest – which is presumably the only part he can reach. “Why are you so tall? Why are you even... like, what is that about?”

“Uh, genetics and diet, I guess,” says Rhys. “Wait, that-”

“Sounded cooler in your head?”

“I... yeah. Well. Not really, actually. It sounded pretty stupid in my head too. I don't know why I- look, just forget I said it. We can pretend I said something cool, yeah?”

Vaughn winks conspiratorially, and makes finger pistols at him. “Got it. Your secret is safe with me. You know, you're lucky I love you, bro.”

“Hey,” says Rhys, also making finger pistols and grinning like a complete idiot, “I love you too, man.”

 

He's still grinning when Vaughn pulls him in for a kiss, although perhaps that's not so surprising. He spends quite a lot of his time around Vaughn grinning. They end up tumbling back onto the couch, laughing and bumping noses and talking ridiculous nonsense at each other – and occasionally actually managing to sneak a kiss in through the chatter.

 

Then the bathroom door swings open again.

“You kids want anything?” says Yvette, breezing into the room and adjusting her glasses smartly, “Some snacks? A condom?”

Vaughn makes a disgruntled whine at the intrusion, and Rhys lobs a cushion at Yvette. It misses by a margin so big that the throw becomes almost impressive in its ineptitude.

She throws it back. She does not miss. Yvette never misses. “Come on,” she grumbles, “You're going to make me late for your date.” She starts pulling her shoes on as Vaughn and Rhys begrudgingly disentangle themselves, then frowns. “Hey, look, I don't have to come if you don't want me to. I just... I don't know.” She sighs. “I've probably got work to catch up on. I should stay home.”

Rhys and Vaughn sit bolt upright, in perfect unison. “Of course we want you to come with us!” says Vaughn.

“What's wrong?” says Rhys.

“No, it's fine. You guys are dating, I get that. I just... you know, we always used to do things together and now I have to scrape in every time I want to hang out with you. I mean, don't get me wrong, I am the queen of scraping in and I honestly impress myself with my abilities, but sometimes it'd be nice to just. Spend some time together.”

Rhys and Vaughn glance at each other, then at Yvette, and then as one they scramble off the sofa and fling their arms around her.

“Shut up!” says Rhys, “You can crash all our dates.”

“You can crash some of our dates,” says Vaughn, who is admittedly maybe a little more level-headed in the face of Yvette doing puppy eyes.

Yvette giggles. “Aw, now you're being soppy. I just want to see more of you two, you know?”

“Eh,” says Vaughn, “I've seen pretty much all of Rhys and it's not actually all that-”

“Excuse me?” says Rhys, over the sound of Yvette snort-laughing into his ear.

“I'm kidding,” says Vaughn, trying his level best to get his arms round both of the others at once. “I love you guys.”

“Yeah I... me too,” says Rhys.

Yvette pulls herself away, shaking her head mockingly. “And I'm just using you for the free food.”

“Yvette!”

She turns away, and rattles the car keys, “Come on, are we going out or not?”

Rhys sensibly chooses not to comment on the fact that she sounds ever so slightly choked up, and when she turns back to beckon them out of the door she's definitely a little misty-eyed, smiling away.

 

Yvette drives. Yvette has to drive, in fairness, because Vaughn saw Fury Road last week and has been frankly terrifying to be in a car with ever since. Of course, Rhys could drive, but Vaughn gets carsick if he sits in the back, so he gets shotgun and Yvette gets to drive and Rhys gets to lie across all three back seats and pout sadly at Yvette every time she glances in the rear-view mirror and tells him to put his goddamn seatbelt on and stop sulking.

 

When they get to the theme park they make a beeline for the foodstalls, Yvette way out ahead and beaming away to herself – presumably at the prospect of making the others buy her horrible overpriced food - when Rhys hears somebody shouting his name.

“Oh crap,” says Vaughn, “Doesn't Fiona work here in the summer?”

“Shit,” mutters Rhys – and then he barely has time to glance round before Fiona is right in front of him, absolutely fuming.

“You!”

He narrows his eyes. “You.”

“You lying goddamn JACKASS! I can't believe you screwed me over like that! And then you have the nerve to show up here-”

“Oh, so I screwed you over? Huh? You're just trying to shift the blame because you won't admit that you play monopoly like some kind of thieving-”

Yvette stalks back over from the food stand, glaring. “What did I say about bringing that game up? Look at yourselves. People are staring! No more of it, you hear me? It's a game. You all need to calm down. I'm officially banning every single one of you from talking about it, if all you can do is yell.”

Fiona looks over at Yvette and suddenly straightens up, trying to brush some of the dirt off her shirt – kind of a lost cause, Rhys thinks, given that it seems to be more dirt than shirt at this point.

“Hi, sorry about that,” mutters Fiona, “I didn't see you there and I- oh, wow, you look nice today.” She freezes up, and Rhys can almost see the gears whirling behind her eyes as she follows it up with a slighty flustered “I mean, you look nice every day, but just... especially nice... I mean, not that you don't look equally especially nice, uh, all the time. But maybe particularly especially... nice... today. Um.”

Yvette giggles. “Well thank you. You look nice too.”

“I haven't washed in three days,” blurts Fiona.

 

Total silence. Yvette stares at her. Vaughn stares at her. Rhys just puts his head in his hands, unable to cope with the sheer level of second-hand embarrassment.

“Ok,” says Fiona, “So, uh, what happened there is that I mean to say thank you.”

“Right,” nods Yvette.

“But in my head I was like, oh my god, I really should shower. And change.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And somewhere those two things got messed up and I just...”

Yvette raises an eyebrow, a tiny smirk playing over her lips. “Mmm.”

Fiona stands there for a moment, then slowly starts to shuffle away. “I should... I have some... I have this thing I need to-”

“Busy busy, huh?” purrs Yvette.

“Right! Yeah. But, uh, before I go could I just punch Rhys? Just once, to get it out of my system.”

Rhys grins smugly. “Uh, I don't think so. We're not talking about that game any more, remember? Forgive and forget.”

Yvette shrugs. “Go for it.”

 

Rhys doesn't even have time to register the utter betrayal before he's on the floor. Vaughn helps haul him up, but Yvette is just staring at Fiona in what can only be described as awe.

“Nice right hook. Wow.”

Fiona rubs the back of her neck, going steadily pink. “Oh, uh, thanks. It's, uh... I try.”

“No, seriously! I mean, I have seen Rhys get hit a lot of times, but that was impressive.”

“Impressive enough that you'll forget about me mentioning not having washed?” says Fiona, looking hopeful.

“Not quite there yet.”

“Oh. Right.”

Yvette looks her up and down very, very slowly. “Maybe impressive enough that you can buy me lunch sometime, though.”

Fiona looks a lot as though she's screaming behind the eyes, and she makes a startled choking noise before pulling herself together with a shrug and what might be an attempt to sound nonchalant. “Yeah, sure. Next tuesday?”

Rhys finally gets to his feet, and turns to Yvette with a furious scowl. “I can't believe you let her-”

Yvette puts a hand over his mouth, keeping her eyes fixed on Fiona. “Suits me,” she says.

Fiona clears her throat. “Well, it's been nice, but I should probably be heading off and doing. Important things. Just. Those important things I've gotta be doing.”

Yvette raises an eyebrow.

“I mean, I say important... Uh. Scooter wants me to man the dodgems over his break, so...”

“Well, what are you waiting for? Run along,” chirps Yvette.

And Fiona, still looking slightly pink and smiling away to herself, does just that.

 

Once Fiona's out of sight, Yvette takes her hand off Rhys' mouth.

Rhys takes a deep breath. “I. Cannot. Believe-”

“Rhys, I'm sorry – I'm sorry! I didn't think she'd actually hit you.” Yvette doesn't look especially sorry. She looks smug as all hell.

“What?! What else did you think she was going to do?”

“Ok so maybe I did think she'd hit you, but not quite that hard.”

“Yvette!”

“Oh, come on, think of it as wingman duties.”

“Wingman duties do not involve getting punched! Look, I have a bruise coming up on my cheek and everything,” whines Rhys.

“No you don't,” says Yvette.

“Ok, so, maybe not. But I could have!”

“But you don't.”

“You let her hit me!”

“All in service of me getting a date, Rhys.”

“That is not acceptable! At all!”

Yvette sighs. “Alright, fine, I'm sorry. But the amount of embarrassing shit I did to help you hook up with Vaughn – come on, you have to admit you owe me.”

Rhys is about to snap back, but even he has to concede that Yvette has a point. So he does. “You... have a point,” he says.

“Wait, what?” says Vaughn, “I didn't know you-”

“Aha, no, you don't need to hear about any of that,” says Rhys, shaking his head firmly.

“Yvette?” asks Vaughn.

She also shakes her head. “Nuh-uh. You really don't need to hear it. It worked and that's what matters.”

“But-”

“Anyway, who wants to buy me some horrible fairground food!”

“Wait but-” says Vaughn.

“I do!” says Rhys, grabbing her by the arm and steering them back over toward the food stands. Vaughn trails after them, shaking his head.

 

He looks as though he might pursue his line of questioning, but then they get distracted by Yvette begging them to lend her a few dollars for candyfloss – and then a hot dog, and then a drink, and then Rhys loses track and just resigns himself to a life of poverty as a consequence of his friend's mysterious inability to ever have her purse on her when she needs food. Then Professor Jack calls - again – and offers some kind of weird advice about the next essay Rhys has due, and says cupcake enough times that he feels slightly uncomfortable, and when Rhys asks how exactly he got a hold of his mobile number Jack just laughs and hangs up. Then they bump into Sasha, and Rhys almost gets punched again when he asks her if she's there with August, (“I'm not with August! We just happen to be here at the same time and he needed a hand on that damn shooting game and- stop laughing! I will hit you Rhys, I mean it! He might not even be here any more, for all I know – he went off to call his mom and I lost him in the crowds. Not that I care. I said stop laughing, asshole!”), but she calms down after he wins her a flower at one of the throw-a-hoop stands (“Aw, Rhys, that has to be the first time I've seen you actually throw something and not miss! Nice one.”). Then August shows up again, and the pair make their (very flimsy) excuses as to why they both have to leave, right now – not with each other, of course, not at all, but they might possibly be headed in the same direction so they might as well walk together just for a bit...

 

Yvette shakes her head at them as they slink away, backs of their hands brushing together as they walk.

“Not really sure how either of them thinks they're fooling anyone.”

“I can't believe she hooked up with him just to get him to team up with her and Fiona for that Monopoly game,” says Rhys.

“I can't believe he still wants to date her even after he found out,” says Vaughn.

“I can't believe you're still bringing up a subject which I have officially banned,” says Yvette.

“Oops.”

“... sorry.”

She narrows her eyes at them. “You better be.”

Vaughn suddenly stops, fast enough that Rhys almost bumps into him – almost trips over him, more like, given the height difference.

“Wooooooooah,” says Vaughn, staring wide-eyed to his right. “That. Is a very big rollercoaster.”

Rhys turns, catching a glimpse of a car full of screaming people swirling down a ridiculously steep drop. “Wow. Yup. That's big. I feel slightly nauseous just looking at-”  
Vaughn grabs Rhys by the hand, bouncing up and down slightly. “Look! Oh man that is just the coolest thing I have ever seen! I want to go on it. Right now. Rhys, come on, look at it! Oh man. Oh man.”

 

And here's the thing – Rhys hates roller-coasters. Hates them. But Vaughn is gazing up at him with huge expectant eyes and while he's looking at Vaughn it's so, so easy to forget that he hates roller-coasters and that they're too fast and they make him feel sick and, and – well, maybe he does hate roller-coasters, but he loves Vaughn more. And Vaughn just looks so happy and expectant and, frankly, Rhys is a sucker, so he finds himself nodding and saying, “Sure man, we can go on the roller-coaster.”

Vaughn looks up at him with such beaming adoration that he almost feels like it might be worth it. Then he looks at the roller-coaster again and his stomach just drops.

Yvette seems to be thinking along similar lines, because she starts very slowly backing away. “Wow, you know, much as I would love to ride the, uh,” she eyeballs the sign in front of the queue for the ride, “Super-Mega-Killer-Ultra-Death-Coaster, I'm kinda feeling like maybe you guys should get a little bit of time alone. Since it's a date. And, I mean, you know me, I do not like to impose myself on-”

“Oh, hey, it wouldn't be imposing,” says Vaughn, “You have to come with us! It's going to be so fun!”

“Yeah Yvette,” says Rhys, determined that at least if he's going to die he's bringing everyone he can down with him, “It's going to be fun.”

“Wow, that is so sweet of you to be so concerned about me having fun, but actually I'm thinking that maybe Fiona's had her shower by now. Or maybe she's still in the shower. I could go and-”

“What,” says Rhys, through gritted teeth, “and miss all the fun we're going to have?”

“Because that would be such a shame,” Yvette growls back, “I'm really going to be sad if I miss the chance to get hurled through the sky with a bunch of screaming teenagers while I try desperately not to throw up.”

Vaughn's face falls slightly. “Are you two alright? Because we don't have to go on the roller-coaster if you guys don't want to. I wouldn't want to-”

“No, no,” says Rhys, “we want to go, don't we, Yvette?”

Yvette looks momentarily torn, then relents. “Yeah, of course we do, Vaughn. It's going to be... fun.”

“So much fun!” laughs Vaughn, grabbing them both by the hands and dragging them forwards toward the queue.

 

The line seems to wizz forward, in clear contradiction of the normal rules of queuing at theme parks, which dictate that any given queue takes twice as long as it should do given the length, and that somehow no matter which ride you chose, the queue for your ride is always the longest in the park. When they reach the front of the queue, Rhys grasps at one last possible straw and points desperately at the 'you must be this tall to ride this ride' sign.

“Hey, Vaughn, you sure you're gonna be-”

Vaughn chuckles and claps him on the arm. “Yeah, very funny dude. I'm not that short. Just because you and Yvette have amazing legs...”

“Mine are better,” says Yvette.

“Mine are longer,” says Rhys.

“Size isn't everything,” she smirks.

“Yeah, well, you-”

 

And suddenly they're at the front of the line. End of the line, thinks Rhys, darkly, as a chipper girl in a theme-park branded cap and shirt ushers them into their seats.

Yvette grabs his hand and whispers, “If we die, I'm going to kill you.”

Vaughn takes his other hand and smiles. “Bro, this is going to be sick!”

“Dude, I hate to say it but that is probably a lot more literally true than you necessarily- ARGH!” says Rhys, as the ride starts moving.

Vaughn laughs. “You're not scared, are you? We're only just crawling, look, we're not even at the first drop!”

“Yeah, I'm not scared. I'm totally fine with it. Why wouldn't I be?”

“Well, you did just scream a little, bro.”

Rhys can feel Yvette grabbing one of his hands with an absolute death grip, and although he can't feel Vaughn's hand resting on his prosthetic he's pretty sure it isn't holding on anything like as tightly, because for some reason, Vaughn is actually... enjoying this? “Uh, no,”says Rhys, “I'm fine. I'm not scared of-”

 

At which point, they reach the first drop, and Rhys shrieks in abject terror. Distantly he is aware that Yvette is also screaming, and that Vaughn has both hands in the air and is whooping with glee. Rhys can only surmise that Vaughn is a sick and twisted individual, because there is nothing – nothing – about this that could remotely be considered fun. They hurtle round corners, they shoot up dizzying ascents, they shoot down even more dizzying descents... at one point Rhys is pretty sure his heart stops. Probably. Ok, maybe not but he is very afraid. And also feeling distinctly queasy. Very queasy. Extremely queasy. He clamps his mouth shut, glancing at Yvette just before the final drop. She looks almost as green as he feels. And then they go over the edge and, as only true friends do, manage to vomit in perfect unison. Rhys might almost feel sorry for the poor soul behind him, but he's too busy feeling ill and terrified, and in any case, he likes to think of himself as the kind of hard-nosed all-business type of guy who doesn't care about other people and their desire not to be vomited on when on a roller-coaster.

 

Thankfully, it ends. Rhys and Yvette stumble off, clinging on to each other and making tiny whining noises, which is about all the communication either of them are up to. Vaughn leaps out of his seat, clapping his hands together in glee. “That. Was. AWESOME! We should do it again right- oh, hey, are you two alright?”

Rhys shakes his head.

Yvette shakes her head.

Vaughn sighs. “I guess we're not going on it again, then.”

Rhys moans quietly. Yvette looks as though she might cry.

“Well,” says Vaughn, “At least you look good in the picture!”

Rhys glances up at the big screen, currently displaying a photograph of Vaughn grinning wildly, with himself and Yvette in a very attractive state of total fear and anguish. And also mid-vomit. Nice.

Vaughn looks up at it, snorting with laughter. “Man, if I hadn't just spent all my money buying Yvette food, I would totally buy that. Frame it and put it up on the living room wall. Look at you two. Aww.”

“You are a bad person,” grumbles Yvette.

“The worst,” agrees Rhys.

“We're all bad people,” says Vaughn, cheerfully. “That is what friendship is all about. Being bad people together, as a team. Now, come on,” he says, tugging them off toward the exit, “Lets get you both home.”

 


End file.
